NVIDIA just released its new SHIELD set top-box with upgraded design and controllers and plenty of goodies including Android 7.0 Nougat. But for those of you who have the first SHIELD TV from 2015, there's another goodie in store: NVIDIA is releasing Experience Upgrade 5.0, a software update that brings a lot of what the new SHIELD has to your existing unit. I know this ruins your excuse for buying fresh gear, so you'll have to work harder to find a new one.

So what does Experience Upgrade 5.0 have in store? First, it updates your SHIELD TV to Android 7.0, which has a new recent apps page, picture-in-picture mode for supported apps, a new settings menu, and some other improvements. Next is Amazon Video support, which if I'm not mistaken, is one of the rare times we see Amazon Video officially available on an Android TV device.

There is also a new NVIDIA Games app to replace the SHIELD Hub app, the promised NVIDIA GeForce upgrades (though the pricing on the new GeForce Now service isn't very enticing), enhanced GameStream support to 4K HDR, plenty of new games and apps to enjoy including NFL, Twitter for TV, Comedy Central, Lumo, No Man's Sky, The Witness, Space Marshals 2, and more. And one final notable addition is the Nest app, which lets you livestream your cameras or watch recorded events straight on your TV set.

The update should start rolling to users soon, so be ready for some serious improvements when it does. This is another instance of NVIDIA doing right by its users and I think this gives me, and many more of you, more confidence in the company's products knowing they'll be supported in a timely manner and for a long time.

Turns out NVIDIA mistakenly listed the Experience Upgrade 5.0 for the 2015 SHIELD TV, whereas it was really meant for the out-of-the-box OTA for the 2017 model. However, the same update should be out within a week or so for SHIELD TV 2015, according to the information we have from NVIDIA as well as a series of tweets from an NVIDIA QA engineer:

@ghostyroasty We are not quite finished. Very soon. Thank you for your patience.